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Review

One of the world’s most overrated directors (Jason Reitman, of Juno) and one of its most obnoxious screenwriters (Diablo Cody, of Juno) deliver a tight, hilarious first half-hour in their latest collaboration, Young Adult.
Charlize Theron plays Mavis, a divorced, 37-year-old ex-prom queen who
works as a ghostwriter on a dying series of YA novels, drinks herself
into oblivion every night, and wakes up fully dressed (still wearing her
falsies) with her little dog hovering over her. After getting a birth
announcement e-mail (with a baby photo) from her high-school flame,
Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson), Mavis throws some clothes into a bag
(leaving a one-night stand asleep in her bed) and takes off for her
Minnesota hometown, blasting a mix tape he made for her, committed to
winning him away from his wife. That this is immoral, outrageous, and
downright delusional is part of Mavis’s — and the movie’s — gonzo charm.
Theron’s blurred baby blues send out mean beams, and her Bugs Bunny
grin guarantees mischief: She’s a deliciously poised comedian. Downing
whiskey shots at a bar, Mavis finds herself sitting next to an old
classmate, Matt Freehauf (Patton Oswalt), a diminutive chub with a limp
from a vicious high-school assault. The sad, lonely man-child is
magnetized by this most alpha of alpha girls and becomes both her
disapproving Greek chorus and her groupie. This is going to be fun …

Cody and Reitman’s cheap cynicism creeps in gradually, though
there are glimmers of it even in that good first half-hour. From the
start, it’s clear that Buddy is an idiot, oblivious to Mavis’s
over-the-top come-ons to the point of simplemindedness. (Wilson just
blanks himself out.) For the sake of a laugh, Cody has Mavis, the status
whore, fail to remember Freehauf had the locker next to hers for years —
yet remember he was nationally famous as the victim of a hate crime.
Scene after scene features some kind of shopping expedition in which
Mavis exposes herself—and argues with—another salesperson or
receptionist. (The cringe-worthy pharmacy scene in Juno turns out
to be a Cody template.) The nonstop product placements must be meant to
be ironic (Mavis’s hometown is a sea of chain stores), but I imagine
the money the studio took was sincere: Cody and Reitman are subversive
with one eye on the motherlode.

The problem with Reitman isn’t that he’s shallow, but that he thinks he’s deep and edgy. He’s Cody’s enabler. Young Adult
turns into a movie in which her self-hatred is pitted against her
hatred for people she grew up with who hate her for her success — and
guess which wins? The last big scene is the most loathsome (maybe the
most loathsome of the year): Matt’s nerdy sister (Collette Wolfe) blurts
out that her life and everyone else’s life in that town is meaningless
and begs Mavis to take her back to Minneapolis. This makes Mavis very
happy. She’s a crazy-bitch alcoholic from hell, but at least she’s not
stuck with the losers and breeders in chain-store purgatory. The movie
spreads bad vibes like a virus.
— David Edelstein